The space between truths

The detective's eyes dropped to my pocket before I could hide the phone. "Miss Hart? Who just messaged you?"

"No one." The lie tasted metallic on my tongue. Jace's words were still glowing behind my eyelids—trust no one—and even if I didn't fully believe him, I wasn't about to hand his secrets to a stranger with a badge.

Detective Marlene Cross didn't blink. She stood in the doorway of the motel room, blocking my only exit, her dark coat dusted with fresh snow. Her gaze was steady and patient and absolutely certain that she could outwait me. "You looked at your phone. Your face went pale. Either you're lying or you just got very bad news. Which is it?"

"I'm just tired. It's been a long night."

"Then you won't mind showing me the message."

The command hung in the air. I thought about the blood on Gregory's car seat. I thought about Jace's voice when he said I'm going to end this. I thought about all the things a desperate man might do to protect someone he cared about.

I pulled out my phone and opened my messages to Marcus. The last text was from hours ago. "See? Nothing."

The detective's expression didn't change. "There was another message. A few seconds before I knocked."

"You must be mistaken."

"I'm rarely mistaken." She stepped into the room and closed the door behind her. The click of the lock was the most terrifying sound I'd heard all night. "Let's start over. I'm not here to arrest anyone. I'm here to find Gregory Kingston before someone gets hurt. If you know where Jace went, now's the time."

I backed up until my legs hit the edge of the motel bed. The floral comforter was still rumpled from where Jace had thrown it on the floor. His hoodie was draped over the chair—gray, smoke-stained, still smelling like the fire. The detective noticed it. Her eyes tracked the room like she was cataloging evidence.

"Jace Kingston was here," she said. "You've been here together. You're his tutor. His father threatened you. That's a lot of pressure for a college student."

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"The university already told me about the stalking. Your supervisor, Diane, filed a report after the fire. She was worried about your safety." The detective pulled a small notepad from her coat but didn't open it. "I also know Gregory Kingston has a record. Two DUIs, one domestic disturbance call that his wife refused to press charges on, and a bar fight that put a man in the hospital six years ago. The man's not stable. So when his car turns up abandoned with blood on the driver's seat, and his son—who he just burned out of his apartment—is the last person seen with him, I have questions."

My heart was a drumroll against my ribs. "Jace didn't hurt him."

"How do you know? He left you here alone. He told you to stay put. That doesn't sound like someone who's innocent."

"He was protecting me."

"From what?"

I opened my mouth. Closed it. The truth was on the tip of my tongue—from his father, from the threats, from the fire, from everything—but Jace's warning stopped me. Trust no one. What if the detective wasn't here to help? What if Gregory had friends in the department? What if my words got twisted into something that put Jace in handcuffs?

"I don't know where he went," I said. "He just left. He didn't tell me anything."

"You're lying again."

"I'm not."

The detective studied me for a long moment. Then she sighed and pulled a card from her coat. "When you're ready to tell the truth, call this number. Until then, don't leave town. And if Jace contacts you—"

"He won't. He made it pretty clear he doesn't want me around."

"Then why did he text you to trust no one?"

My blood went cold. She'd seen. She'd definitely seen.

"How did you—"

"I've been doing this job for fifteen years." Detective Cross finally smiled, but it wasn't warm. It was the smile of someone who'd just caught you in a lie and wanted you to know it. "You're not nearly as good at hiding things as you think. Jace warned you not to talk to me. That means he's either guilty of something or he's scared of something. Which is it?"

I didn't answer. My hands were shaking, so I crossed my arms tight against my chest. The motel room felt smaller with every breath she took.

"Let me tell you a story," she said, leaning against the dresser. "Gregory Kingston has been on our radar for years. Not just for the DUIs. We've had reports—anonymous, mostly—about what went on in that house. About what he did to his wife. About what his son witnessed. But no one ever pressed charges. No one ever testified. And now Jace is a star athlete with a draft pick and a future, and his father is a washed-up drunk who sees that future as his own second chance. You see where I'm going with this?"

"You think Jace snapped."

"I think anyone would snap under that kind of pressure." Her voice wasn't cruel. It was almost sympathetic. "But I also think Jace Kingston isn't his father. I've seen the tape from the parking garage at the arena last week. Gregory showed up drunk, pushed his son around. Jace didn't hit back. He just stood there and took it. That's not the reaction of a violent man."

I remembered the rainstorm. The split lip. The way Jace had flinched when I reached for his face. "He's not violent. He's terrified."

"Of what?"

I hesitated. The detective waited. The snow tapped against the window like fingers.

"Of becoming his father," I whispered. "He thinks it's in his blood. He thinks if he ever actually fights back, he'll never stop."

Detective Cross nodded slowly. "Then help me find him before he does something he can't take back."

I wanted to help. Every rational part of me knew that the detective was probably honest, probably trying to do her job. But the other part—the part that had watched my mother die because she trusted the wrong people—kept screaming at me to stay quiet.

"I can't," I said. "I'm sorry. I don't know where he is."

The detective's expression flickered. Disappointment. Maybe respect. "You're protecting him."

"I'm protecting myself."

"From what?"

"From the same thing my mother couldn't escape." I stood up, forcing strength into my legs. "I've spent my whole life cleaning up after people who made bad choices. I can't afford to make one myself. Jace told me to stay out of it, so I'm staying out of it."

"Even if staying out of it gets him killed?"

The question hit me like a body check. I hadn't thought of that. I'd been so focused on the danger to me—the eviction, the stalking, the threats—that I hadn't considered that Jace was out there alone, tracking a violent man who'd already burned down his home.

"He's not answering my texts," I admitted. "The last one just said he'd find me."

Detective Cross pulled out her phone. "I'm going to put out a BOLO for Jace's description. Not as a suspect—as a missing person. If his father is bleeding somewhere, Jace might be hurt too."

"He's not hurt."

"How do you know?"

"Because he texted me." I held up my phone, showing her the screen. "He's alive. He's just—"

The phone buzzed in my hand. Another message. Not from Jace this time. Unknown number.

I opened it without thinking, and the words made my entire body go numb.

Unknown: The motel is surrounded. You have five minutes to get out before they burn it down too. Don't trust the cop. She's not who she says she is.

I stared at the screen, my mind racing. The detective was still talking, something about backup and search grids, but I couldn't hear her over the roaring in my ears.

"Miss Hart? You look pale. What is it?"

I looked up at her—at her badge, her coat, her calm professional face—and I didn't know if I was looking at a real detective or someone Gregory had sent to finish what he started.

"Nothing," I said. "I just need some air."

I grabbed Jace's hoodie from the chair and my bag from the floor and I walked straight past her to the door. She called my name, but I didn't stop. I didn't run either—running would look guilty—but I moved fast, my heart slamming against my ribs, every shadow in the parking lot a potential threat.

The snow was falling harder now. The motel sign flickered pink and blue across the empty cars. I scanned the lot, the street, the dark line of trees at the edge of the property. Nothing moved. No one was there. But the message had said five minutes.

I pulled out my phone and typed a response with shaking fingers: Who is this? How do I know you're telling the truth?

The answer came in seconds.

Unknown: Because I'm the one who saw Gregory Kingston get into a black SUV ten minutes ago. He wasn't bleeding. He was smiling. And the woman you're talking to is his ex-wife.

My blood froze. Ex-wife. Jace's mother. The woman in the photograph he kept hidden in his drawer. The woman Gregory beat for eleven years. She was supposed to be gone. She was supposed to be safe. But she was here, in my motel room, wearing a detective's badge.

I turned back toward the door just as the light in the room went out.

And from the darkness inside, a voice—not Detective Cross's, not anymore—called out softly, "Sophie, dear. You should have run when you had the chance."